Peter Hain, the Northern Ireland Secretary, yesterdayissued a rare endorsement by a UK minister of a White Housecandidate, praising Hillary Clinton and stating that itwould "be fantastic to have a woman president".

Mr Hain was visiting Washington to ask for President GeorgeW Bush's administration help in persuading Ian Paisley, theDemocratic Unionist Party leader, to sit in government withSinn Fein next month.

But he took time out to express his support for Democrats.

Before meeting Senator Clinton for the fourth time as aminister, he said: "When the Democrats won last November[in the mid-term congressional elections] of course everyLabour member, like me, cheered because they're our sisterparty."

Mr Hain also met Senator John McCain, a Republicancandidate who could face Mrs Clinton in the 2008presidential election, but clearly backed his rival.

Last month, Mr Hain blasted the Bush administration as "themost right-wing American administration, if not ever, thenin living memory" and a failure.

"The neo-con mission has failed," he told the NewStatesman.

"It's not only failed to provide a coherent internationalpolicy, it's failed wherever it's been tried, and it'sfailed with the American electorate, who kicked it intotouch last November.

"So if neo-con unilateralism has damaged the fight againstglobal terrorism and taken the world's eyes off the ball ofsolving the Middle East conflict, for example, we've got toreally get back on that agenda."

He is understood to have urged the Bush administration toinvite Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness of Sinn Fein to begiven a presidential audience at next month's St Patrick'sDay celebration in Washington.

The Sinn Fein Ard Chomhairle met this morning in Dublin tofinalise preparations for the Assembly election campaignand the upcoming Sinn Fein Ard Fheis. Speaking after themeeting party General Secretary Mitchel McLaughlin saidthat his party was 'absolutely committed to entering apower sharing Executive on March 26th'.

Mr McLaughlin said:

"The point of this Assembly election campaign has to beabout ensuring that a fully functioning Assembly, Executiveand All-Ireland Bodies are put in place by March 26th. Thatis what the two governments set out in their St. Andrewsproposals and that is what Sinn Fein will be holding themto deliver.

"Let me state again in clear terms, Sinn Fein areabsolutely committed to entering a power sharing executivewith the rest of the parties on March 26th. That is whatour focus is on. The recent Sinn Fein Ard Fheis hasliberated the political process and the opportunitiescreated must now be grasped by all.

"This is the last chance for those who have stood in theway of progress for so long to come on board. There areonly two options facing the parties. Either we go with PlanA, the Good Friday Agreement and set up the politicalinstitutions. This has to be the best option. Or thegovernments will implement their joint managementproposals. There are no other options. There is no Plan Cor D.

"I very much hope that we proceed into institutions onMarch 26th. Parties who oppose this approach are in effectgiving British Direct Rule Ministers a blank cheque toimpose water charges, privatise further public services andcontinue with disastrous cuts in health and education."ENDS

The group which provides political analysis to the UDA lastnight appealed to everyone in the unionist community tovote in next month's Assembly elections.

And Frankie Gallagher of the Ulster Political ResearchGroup (UPRG) urged loyalists to vote for the mainstreamunionist parties.

He also claimed independent unionists who oppose the RevIan Paisley and Sir Reg Empey want to see Sinn Fein securethe First Minister post.

The east Belfast man believes many such candidates want tosee Sinn Fein top the poll so the Assembly will collapsebecause the DUP will refuse to work under republicans.

Mr Gallagher was speaking after it emerged consultationsbetween the UDA leadership, its members and the UPRG on thefuture direction of the paramilitary organisation are stillongoing.

As part of the talks, UDA members have been advised thatthe best way of promoting the aims of loyalism is throughdemocracy.

But the UPRG believes that if political stability iscreated in Northern Ireland, it could create an environmentwhere violence and weapons can be a thing of the past.

Said Mr Gallagher: "Loyalists must learn how to make theballot-box work because weaponry is no longer a viableoption. We must learn to utilise the ballot-box to maximumeffect because dividing unionism is not the way to do that,as some would have us believe."

The senior UPRG man also pleaded with unionists opposed tothe DUP sharing power with Sinn Fein to debate the peaceprocess with him.

Added the east Belfast loyalist: "I am more than willing tomeet with people from a unionist background who don't wantthe DUP to share power with Sinn Fein.

"We have to have political stability if we are to completethe conflict transformation process.

Sinn Fein leaders met the Northern Ireland police commanderon Friday for the first time since the Irish RepublicanArmy-linked party voted to back law and order in theBritish territory.

"We think this is a very important first step in a wholeprocess of delivering a new relationship between ourcommunity and the police," Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adamssaid following his delegation's 90-minute meeting inBelfast with Chief Constable Hugh Orde, commander of thePolice Service of Northern Ireland.

Adams has met Orde twice before, in November 2004 andDecember 2006, as he edged his long-militant party towardcooperation with British law and order. Friday's meetingwas considered significant because it followed theoverwhelming Jan. 28 vote by Sinn Fein's grass-rootsmembership to abandon its decades-old refusal to cooperatewith the predominantly Protestant police.

Adams said the meeting would be "one in the start of aprocess of engagements, so that we all get policing right."

Sinn Fein, the major Catholic-backed party in NorthernIreland, is hoping to increase its strength in a March 7election for the Northern Ireland Assembly. Britain expectsthe assembly to elect a Catholic-Protestant administrationthe following week that would be led by Sinn Fein and theDemocratic Unionists, who represent most of the province'sBritish Protestant majority.

Orde, a former deputy commander of London's MetropolitanPolice, did not comment after meeting Sinn Fein.

Britain appointed Orde as police commander in NorthernIreland in 2002 to oversee a mammoth overhaul of theheavily militarized Royal Ulster Constabulary. A 10-yearreform program begun in 2001 has seen the force renamed thePolice Service, given new uniforms and badges, and pursue apolicy of preferential recruitment of Catholics.

Protestants say they will not share power - the centralgoal of Northern Ireland's Good Friday peace accord of 1998- unless Sinn Fein begins working with the police. Analystssay Sinn Fein's dramatic U-turn on policing should win theparty extra votes versus their moderate Catholic rivals,the Social Democratic and Labour Party or SDLP.

But anti-Sinn Fein die-hards are running against Sinn Feincandidates in the most hard-line Catholic areas to protestwhat they say is a sellout of traditional IRA policies.

A leading IRA traditionalist from the United States, NewYork lawyer Martin Galvin, arrived Friday in Belfast tocampaign on behalf of two candidates who oppose Sinn Fein'srecent compromises.

Galvin, who was ousted several years ago as director ofIrish Northern Aid, the U.S. fund-raising arm of the IRA,said Sinn Fein's decision to accept the police meant it was"enforcing British law and the British state."

"Having opposed for 30 years those who gave legitimacy tothe British crown forces, they have now done exactly theopposite of what they said. They are doing exactly whatthey criticized the SDLP for," Galvin said.

Wartime debt to Britain's East European allies boosts abattle against racism on estate

Henry McDonald, Ireland editorSunday February 18, 2007The Observer

The contribution made by Polish pilots during the SecondWorld War is being used as a weapon in the fight againstracism in Northern Ireland.

An estate infamous for the expulsion of Catholics duringthe Anglo-Irish Agreement protests is welcoming an influxof Catholic residents from eastern Europe. And the UlsterDefence Association is so keen to prevent the new arrivalsfrom leaving, it has leafleted Lisburn urging loyalists tosupport the migrant workers and their families, with oneleaflet reminding loyalists of Poland's contribution to thewar effort.

Eighteen Polish families and smaller numbers from the CzechRepublic, Latvia and Lithuania have settled in the OldWarren estate, Lisburn, where the UDA is hoping to reversethe recent upsurge in attacks on immigrants, mainly inProtestant working-class areas. An Observer survey lastyear found that more than 90 per cent of all reportedattacks on immigrants took place in loyalist areas.

'We wanted loyalist people to remember the contribution thePoles made to defeating Hitler,' said Colin Halliday, anex-UDA prisoner who is now a community worker on the OldWarren estate. 'We were determined to counteract all thebad publicity loyalist areas received in recent years aboutracial and xenophobic attacks. So we pointed out that youcouldn't be loyal to Britain and a racist.'

Halliday was talking inside the Welcome House, a new nervecentre for the Polish and eastern European families livingthroughout Lisburn. Inside the house in Dromara Park wasHalliday's close friend Daniel Konieczny, from Jawor inPoland. He has lived in Lisburn for three years and worksclosely with Halliday and other loyalist community workerson the estate. Along with the staff at the Welcome House,Konieczny provides English classes for migrants and Polishclasses for the Northern Irish residents of Old Warren, andthey run joint Polish-Northern Irish soccer and basketballteams on the estate to integrate children from theindigenous and migrant communities.

Some of the eastern Europeans have become so integrated asto produce amusing results. 'Last July, during the marchingseason, this Latvian guy noticed all these Ulster flagsgoing up in his street. So he went out and bought an Ulsterflag, which he knew nothing about, so his house could fitin. He was flying it on the 12th, even though he hadn't aclue what it was all about,' Konieczny said.

Fiona McCausland, who grew up in Lisburn and helps run theWelcome House, said local people were adamant that themigrants must feel this was their home. 'We made it clearto them that, if they wanted to send their kids to thelocal Catholic primary school, there would be no hassle.Some Polish communities in Northern Ireland that reside inloyalist areas send their kids to state schools; they fearthat the uniform of a Catholic school might mark them outfor sectarian attack.

'We were determined not to let that happen on the OldWarren estate. The community here liaised with the localCatholic primary school to ensure that those Polishfamilies who wanted to could send their kids to StAloysius's. It has worked wonderfully.'

Olga Dominiak came to Lisburn from Belarus two years agowith her husband and daughter. A Polish and Russianspeaker, she acts as an interpreter at the Welcome House.'We use this place as an advice centre for the migrantworkers and their families. Many of them used to be afraidto ask for things they are entitled to, like child benefit.Now, through the classes and the drop-in centre, they aretaking these benefits up. This place helped me integrate acouple of years ago and it's doing the same for dozens ofothers,' she said.

The scheme on the Old Warren is winning praise across thepolitical divide, with Secretary of State Peter Haincalling it a model of tolerance and integration. Hallidayagrees: 'The UDA in south Belfast has been studying what wedo here. I have brought Daniel along to talk to fellowloyalists about how they can integrate the migrants intotheir communities. This is the way forward. It's all aboutcombating ignorance and fear.'

The more of these fortnightly columns I write, the more Irealise that I am pretty much a 'one-trick pony'.

What I mean is that, while there are many things I couldwrite about, the one issue that is continually on my mind,and in many ways has come to define my life, is the searchfor a lasting peace and the building of structures thatwill lead to a 'shared future' for us all.

I make no apologies for this, because I believe therealisation of a shared future to be one of the greatestchallenges facing our society.

Let's face it, if Northern Ireland is to take its placeamong the nations of the world as an attractive place tolive and bring up a family, a place where inward investmentis not only encouraged but also delivered, and where peaceand stability become the norm, this issue has to beaddressed.

In the past, a convenient scapegoat for the 'ghettoisation'of the province has been laid at the door of some of ourpoliticians with their own particular brand of tribalpolitics.

Although I believe this claim to be not without substance,it may also be the case that we should look a little closerto home for other less well-known culprits - maybe evenpeople like you and me.

Research carried out a few years ago by University ofUlster academic Peter Shirlow disturbingly suggested thatNorthern Ireland was more polarised then than at any timebefore the signing of the Good Friday Agreement.

Does that mean the Good Friday Agreement has not worked? Ofcourse not.

But it does suggest that peace deals and politicalagreements alone are not enough to build a shared future -sectarianism must be tackled.

We have to take affirmative action to combat sectarianismand build relationships with the 'other'.

With that in mind, and in the run-up to yet anotherelection, I thought, rather than put the spotlight on thepoliticians (don't worry, I shall return to them nexttime), I would cite examples of initiatives taken byordinary people - initiatives that have certainly inspiredme to reach out.

People like Albert Creighton, RE teacher at Belfast RoyalAcademy, who along with several of his fellow teachersorganised a seminar for local schools (both controlled andmaintained) on the subject of leadership.

On the panel was my good self, the Rev Ian Paisley, Fr PaulSimmons and Anna Lo from the Chinese Welfare Association.

As each speaker spelled out their vision for the 'new'Northern Ireland, the young audience was encouraged to askquestions - an invitation to which they didn't hesitate torespond.

In my opinion, the event was a huge success - the standardof questioning and informal discussion were certainlyimpressive.

As the event ended, a member of a visiting Catholic schoolmade the comment, "We need to do more of this sort ofthing".

And I couldn't agree more. It's not that cross-communitywork in schools is something new, in fact we even had it inmy day during the early 1980s.

But back then we were asked not to talk about divisivethings such as religion and politics.

I guess that's what was so good about this event - that theschool took a significant 'small step' in opening updialogue and in this scenario we all benefit.

Another initiative that has inspired me, another example ofsomeone taking a 'small step' towards a shared future, isAustin Brown from Life Cycles bike shop in Belfast'sSmithfield.

He organised the Sunday morning cycle ride across theShankill/Falls peaceline that I mentioned in this column afew weeks ago.

A big thank you is extended to Belfast's cycling fraternitywhich turned out in force at the end of January to supportthe seven-mile event.

As the last of them poured into Winetavern Street on thereturn leg of the journey, that old Dylan classic The TimesThey Are A-Changin' blasted out from a loudspeaker that hadbeen pedalled around the streets on a contraptionresembling something from a Mad Max movie.

I have to say there was a tear in my eye as I thought aboutthe 'small step' that had just been taken, and theconsiderably bigger step taken the same day at the SinnFein ard fheis in Dublin (Sinn Fein's historic decision tosupport the police).

The times are indeed changing - thank God - but I couldn'thelp but ponder what has it all been about?

Why so many people dead? Young men imprisoned. For what?

Could we not have arrived at this scenario years ago?Conflict costs - costs us all - which makes the process ofpeace building (even when it does progress in small steps,or the revolutions of a bicycle wheel) all the moreimportant for us all.

Link The Spoof has learned that genealogists working inIreland's remotest parts, have discovered a hithertounknown link between Barack Obama, and the ancient Irishfarming clan, O'Bama. Through a contorted chain of eventsinvolving potato blight, the Titanic, and the slavetriangle, they have confirmed that the O'Bama strain movedfrom Ireland, and reassembled itself firmly in America viaCanada, Africa, the Caribbean, and even Spain.

It seems that Barack Obama has Irish roots after all, notjust like Kennedy, Reagan, and Clinton, but better, thusmaking him eminently suitable to be a President.

Not only that, genealogists using Advance DocumentReassembly techniques, whereby they gather dust, and piecetogether microscopic fragments to recreate original ancientIrish documents, have proved that after the rout of TheSpanish Armada by Sir Walter Raleigh, the fragmented fleetescaped by sailing round Britain. Some of them didn't makeit home, and settled in Ireland's west coast.

A distant relative to Obama, Juan Pedro Olazabal, staggeredashore in Country Cork, and mated immediately with lace-maker Tessa Kitty O'Shea O'Bama, to produce a whole newstrain of the Hispanic-Irish O'Lazabal clan, which due toan inter-clan dispute, split off from the O'Bama clan toestablish roots fairly and squarely in African soil.Through a convoluted twist of fate, the Hispanic-IrishO'Lazabal clan was reunited with the Afro-Irish O'Bama clanin the Caribbean before setting sail once again for the newcolonies, thus creating this vast diaspora we now know asthe United States of America.

The Spoof has learned that this has been validated as onehundred per cent correct by experts everywhere, and istherefore completely true.

No, Big Ian isn't thinking of ditching his long-servingnumber two, but for the first time in years there is thepossibility the DUP leader may NOT be casting his vote forPeter Robinson in East Belfast.

Dr Paisley's poser has arisen because he now has two homesin Northern Ireland. The first, The Parsonage in CyprusAvenue, East Belfast, is where he has resided for over 30years after moving from a detached home nearby on theBeersbridge Road.

The second is Dr and Lady Eileen Paisley's new luxury padinside a gated development in the North Down constituency,where his well-off neighbours include pop star Jim Corr.

The couple acquired a three-bedroom, two reception-roomapartment in the 20-acre Sharman estate besideCrawfordsburn Country Park. It has magnificent views overBelfast Lough to the coast of Scotland.

Party sources have revealed that the Electoral Office haswritten to Dr Paisely asking him where he intends to casthis vote - East Belfast or North Down?

"In all likelihood it will be East Belfast where has votedfor decades. But I don't know if he has formally decidedyet, or informed the Electoral Office," said a partysource.

Sunday Life contacted Dr Paisley's office on Friday but wewere unable to gain an answer to the East Belfast/NorthDown poser.

Peter Robinson has been able to count on Dr Paisley's votein East Belfast since 1979, when he won the constituency'sWestminster seat by defeating the UUP's Bill Craig.

If Irish nationalism has failed, argues Richard English'sIrish Freedom, it was because republican fighters engagedin campaigns they couldn't possibly win

Henry McDonaldSunday February 18, 2007The Observer

Irish Freedom: A History of Nationalism in Irelandby Richard EnglishMacmillan œ25, pp424

The most important quote in this ambitious, epic work onIrish nationalism is in parenthesis, but it should havebeen the book's epigraph. It comes from The Poverty ofHistoricism, Karl Popper's critique of the Marxian notionthat history runs inexorably and predictably towards apromised land: 'The belief in historical destiny is sheersuperstition.'

For the philosopher's assault on Marxism, read RichardEnglish's lucidly written dissection of nationalism inIreland over the last three centuries. Like Popper, Englishdoes not believe that the forward march of Irishnationalism towards a new Celtic Dawn is inevitable or, inthe case of idealistic republicanism, realisable. He notesa chasm between Irish nationalist politicians and modernIrish historians, the latter disputing the former'scontention that there is a single narrative to Ireland's'story'.

Early in the book, English advances the thesis that thereason for the modern Irish Republic having the highestrate of private property ownership per head on the planetcan be traced to the 19th-century land war. Michael Davittand the Irish radicals who fought to wrest control of landaway from the Anglo-Irish ascendancy 'came to favour landnationalisation'. The author connects this radicalism withthe syndicalism of James Connolly. However, the epic landbattles didn't produce agrarian proto-socialism but,rather, through Gladstone's reforms, small-scale landpossession among the peasantry.

He points out that in 1870, only 3 per cent of those livingon the land owned their holdings, yet by 1929 only 3 percent did not. Later advocates of nationalisation were to belet down in the Thirties by the very people they sought toliberate. The land war paradoxically created a sociallyconservative peasantry. So, according to English, thanks toDavitt, his comrades and Gladstone, we have the property-owning democracy of the 21st-century republic. Englishclearly admires the courage of Charles Stewart Parnell andthe sub-religious fervour of Patrick Pearse, a leader ofthe 1916 Rising. His sympathies, though, lie with theconstitutional wing of Irish nationalism, flowing back fromDaniel 'the Liberator' O'Connell, to Parnell, John Redmondand John Hume.

He shows that, in the War of Independence, most of the10,000 casualties were civilians. The parallels here withthe Troubles are stark. Civilians on both sides also borethe highest number of casualties in what was portrayed as apeople's national liberation. And just as English writesabout 1921, so it was at the end of the last 'armedstruggle': 'The outcome was hardly that of republicandreams: Irish unity was not won, and nor was fullindependence; social justice was not achieved, nor economicimprovement quickly built.'

English asserts that partition was probably inevitable evenbefore 1921, arguing that north-east Ireland's industrialrevolution, the traditions of the unionist majority thereand their willingness to fight left Lloyd George and theother British negotiators with little choice but to insiston it.

From then on, the book's theme can be summed up in a singleword: futility. De Valera's economic nationalism, whichturned Eire into a Gaelic autarky, forced tens of thousandsto emigrate from the new state between the late Thirtiesand the late Fifties. The rump of the IRA that refused tofollow de Valera and Fianna Fail into the Dail waged aseries of doomed campaigns, the longest of which was theone put finally to rest recently, the Provisional IRA'sbattle to destroy Northern Ireland circa 1969-1998.

Arguably the most surprising aspect of this superb surveyof Irish nationalism is its front cover, featuring an iconcreated by Bobby Sands and his fellow hunger strikers. Itdepicts a lark (an overused symbol of freedom in Sands'smawkish poetry) breaking free from barbed wire against thebackground of the Irish Tricolour.

On seeing this image in Sinn Fein bookshops across Irelandtoday, it would be understandable for true believers topick up Irish Freedom expecting a homage to that unbrokenlineage of martyrs forging Ireland's grand march. When theydig into the details of this fine work of scholarship, theywill be deeply disappointed.

In the foreword to his new book, Peter Quinn confesses tohaving dropped out of Fordham's graduate program in historyat the end of the 1970s. The parting seems to have beenprovidential. In Looking for Jimmy: A Search for IrishAmerica (Overlook, 320 pages, $26.95), Quinn, a novelistand former editorial director for Time Warner, findsacademic history somewhat wanting, if only because itcannot hold his quarry. Jimmy, Quinn's titular quick-talking, natty-dressing, prototypical Irish-American,prowls not the archives but his descendants' imaginations,memories, and DNA. Combining statistics, family anecdotes,fiction, and conjecture to tail the fugitive, Quinndiscovers not only Jimmy's many hiding places-America'ssocial policies, literary style, even our slang-but alsothe reasons he hides.

Through the book's 21 essays (including some previouslypublished, like "The Tragedy of Bridget Such-a-One," inAmerican Heritage), Quinn begins his search inside his ownIrish-American family and then steadily expands theperimeter, finding wisps of Jimmy in the things allAmericans do and say. His toughest task was to create apicture from these far-flung slivers. The re-creation ofIrish-America necessarily starts with an examination of thedestitute immigrants who fled the 1840s potato famine bythe thousands, and the poor, as a rule, leave scant tracesin the historical record. Apart from ships' manifests andparish marriage registers, the impressions of the firstIrish in America were recorded from above, by members ofthe ruling classes who alternately pitied, feared, anddespised them. The humiliation of those early years, on topof the degradation and horror of the famine, made theimmigrant generation a congenitally forward-looking people,if only because they could not bear to look back.

When Quinn tried to piece together his own family's past,he found cold recorded dates interrupted by extendedsilences. In trying to fill the gaps in Irish-Americanhistory, he found art to be as vivid and representationalas recorded fact, if not more so. In the performances ofJames Cagney, the novels of William Kennedy, and the filmsof John Ford, ghosts take flesh to whisper the story ofIrish America.

Looking for Jimmy leaps back and forth between those twowords and worlds, exposing the effects of the Irish on theUnited States and the United States on the Irish, andrevealing how the Eire of 1847 stirs within even the mostAmerican Sullivan or McCarthy today. By the same token,Quinn recounts his own version of the rude awakening manyIrish-Americans find when they visit the old country-anticipating a land stalled in 1850, populated by great-grandmothers and sepia-toned landscapes-and discover thatmodern Ireland isn't just the past to our present. "Iexpected not so much a warm welcome as a joyous reunionwith the long-lost relatives my family had been separatedfrom a century before. I quickly discovered the separationwas permanent," Quinn writes of a summer semester atUniversity College in Galway in the 1970s. "My fellowstudents saw me as indelibly American. Some were good-natured about it. Others-including some professors-werevehemently contemptuous of Americans in general and IrishAmericans in particular." For Irish-Americans, the leftside of the hyphen is history; for those who never left,Ireland is home. A search for Irish America might start inIreland, but the prize is back across the Atlantic.

"Somewhere in the mass of statistics compiled on theFamine-bowls of soup distributed, evictions, deaths fromfever, departures, etc.-are my ancestors," Quinn writes inthe book's second chapter, "In Search of the BanishedChildren." "They had been swallowed by the anti-romance ofhistory, immigrant ships, cholera sheds, tenement houses.They had dissolved into genetic influence, pigment of skin,size of feet, shape of nose, into unconscious inheritance,presumptions, fears, ambitions, into thin air: theexhalation of the past that shapes the present, like theglassblower's breath in the bubble of hot, melted sand. . .. Memory is more than a recollection of discrete events,battles, inaugurations, assassinations. It is more thanhistory proper. Memory is a reel of endless, hauntedgossip, a montage of snippets, remnants, patches, whispers,wisps, the way our parents held us, the acceptance orreluctance in their arms, shadows on the nursery wall,smell of cut grass, chalk dust, mother's breath."

But if Quinn seeks to rescue his heritage from the "anti-romance of history," he carefully avoids the stereotypesand simplifications of romantic nostalgia. He is unsparingin his descriptions of the poverty, disease, suffering, anddeath caused by the famine, of the immigrants' passageacross the Atlantic, and of their first decades ofresidence in not only a new country but also a completelyforeign settlement pattern. Families that for generationshad lived in small, rural communities ended up in thetenements of America's largest cities. To the entrenchedwhite citizens of nineteenth-century America, theseswelling swarms of half-starved newcomers seemed like analien, backward, dangerous race.

One of the most common words in Quinn's text is struggle.The Irish struggled merely to survive, and the immigrantsstruggled to endure the fierce racism in their new home.But to struggle, rather just than to suffer, is torecognize the possibility of a better future, if not foryourself, than for your descendants. Quinn traces theupward trajectory of Irish-America, from its firstbastions--teenage housemaids, grime-covered railroadworkers, and coal miners--to its apotheosis, the electionof John Kennedy in 1960. Quinn pays particular attention tothe twin institutions that helped Irish immigrants andtheir children orient themselves in a new world: thepolitical machine and the Catholic Church. Like good andevil, sin and redemption, Heaven and Hell, the two areintertwined and inseparable in Quinn's account; both, eachin its own way, offered security and opportunity in abewildering, hostile environment.

While recognizing the modern analogues of the firstgenerations of Irish in America-the Mexican immigrantswhose numbers have sparked another paroxysm of suspicionand fear among more established Americans-Quinn is carefulto note what made the Irish influx unique: It was thecountry's first inpouring of huge numbers of foreignnewcomers, and it happened on an unprecedented scale. "Inthe decade from 1845 to 1855," he writes, "Irish-Catholicimmigration approached that of all groups over the previousseventy years." But for all the success Irish-Americanshave earned since then, he reminds us, "we can bring alongonly what we possess, and if we don't possess our past, ifinstead of a true history and a significant literature, webring along only trivia, empty myths and a handful ofstories, or-worst of all-the latest intellectuallyfashionable versions of ourselves, we will offer those tocome after us nothing of lasting consequence."

The GAA's Central Council last night agreed to lease CrokePark to the IRFU and FAI in 2008.

Central Council had the power to rule that the amendment toRule 42 had expired as work has not yet started onLansdowne Road, but they opted to give the soccer and rugbyauthorities more time.

Three Six Nations ties and two World Cup qualifiers will beheld at GAA Headquarters in 2008, but a decision onfriendly games in both codes was delayed.

But the GAA has warned the IRFU and FAI that if planningpermission for Lansdowne is not forthcoming or if it isdecided the project is not viable the use of Croke Parkwill be withdrawn.

Central Council also ruled out the use of other GAA groundsfor rugby or soccer and stated that no such application hadbeen received.

Delegates hit out at the lack of a reciprocal gesture inTallaght, where a new stadium financed by the governmentand built on local authority land has been exclusively setaside for soccer.

And delegates pointed out that a provision for Gaelic gamespromised in Lansdowne Road has not emerged.

Meanwhile, the GAA denied that a wreath laying ceremonywill take place at the Bloody Sunday memorial in Croke Parkahead of next weekend's Ireland/England rugby game.

Elsewhere, it was decided that in the case where a playerreceives two consecutive yellow cards and a refereeconfirms his decision in writing, his decision cannot beoverturned by the Central Hearings Committee (CHC).

The revised match regulations were also approved. Thesewill again be reviewed after the Allianz National Leagues.

In other matters, GAA Player Welfare Manager Paraic Duffyrevealed that he intends to bring reports on Club Fixturesand Player Burnout to GAA Congress at Kilkenny in April.

The reports will also contain specific proposals aimed atimproving player welfare.

Duffy also pointed out that he has established a system ofdirect line of communication with players countrywide, witha view to creating a database.

A clear statement of player entitlements will be issued toCounty Boards in the next week and Duffy reminded delegatesthat each county must have a County Panel FinanceCommittee.

It was also revealed that a programme where 400 players areset to receive cardiac screening will start within the nextfew weeks.

A Cardiac Questionnaire is set to be issued to all players.

Duffy also revealed that grants for defibrillators arebeing made available to all grounds where inter countymatches are played and that it was hoped that this facilitywould eventually extend to club grounds.

The annual Irish Day, a celebration of Irish culture,music, and tradition, will kick off the parade events (seenext page). Irish Day will be held this year from noon to 6p.m. on Sunday, March 4, at John S. Burke Catholic HighSchool, located on Fletcher Street (Exit 122A off Route 17)in Goshen. (It was previously reported in another newspaperthat mass will be said in the school chapel, but that wasan error.)

Admission is $7 per person, with children under 12 admittedfree.

The musical headliners are two prominent Orange countygroups - The Chris Turpin Band and the AOH Pipe Band - bothof whom have been staples of Irish Day for years. Otherbands to perform include The Men of the Group, an acappella singing group, and The Wild Rovers.

Another highlight is Irish step-dancing by students fromthe Kerry Dance School and the Sheahan-Gormley School ofIrish Dance, both local groups. The Sheahan Gormley Schoolhas also performed for many years at Irish Day.

The master-of-ceremonies will be Kevin Cummings, who ismember of Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH), Division 2 ofCornwall, as well as an officer of the AOH Orange CountyBoard. The chairman of Irish Day is Pat Grennan of Warwick,a member of AOH Division 1 of Monroe. The co-chair is MegMollahan, who is also the chairperson for the Mid-HudsonIrish Rose contest, also to be held on Irish Day. Thecontest is now accepting applications.

The 2007 Grand Marshal, Nancy Corrigan MacDonald of Goshen,will make a short speech.

Ten Irish clubs from Orange County sponsor the Mid-HudsonSt. Patrick's Parade Committee. Of these, three areoriginal sponsors from 1976. They include: AOH Division 1of Monroe, the Middletown-Irish American Society, and theGreenwood Lake Gaelic Cultural Society, which remain fromthe four original clubs. Also included are the Men's AOHDivision 2 of Cornwall, Men's AOH Division 3 of Warwick,and Men's AOH Division 4 of Middletown, Ladies AOH Division3 of Warwick, Ladies' AOH Division 4 of Middletown, St.Brendan's Gaelic Football Club of Monroe, and a newcomer,the Irish Heritage Festival of Goshen.

For more information call Pat at 987-4010, or Meg at 928-3951. For further information and applications for the Mid-Hudson Irish Rose contest, call Meg at the above phonenumber.